It is becoming increasingly common to locate electrical components inside the blades or the hub of a wind turbine. Examples of such components include de-icing systems for melting ice that accumulates on the surfaces of the blades. Known de-icing systems typically include one or more electrical heaters and one or more electrical fans located inside each blade. Aside from de-icing systems, other electrical components located inside the blades may include pitch actuators, lighting systems and sensor systems.
Wind turbines typically include a power source such as an auxiliary transformer located inside the nacelle. Electrical connectors for connecting this power source to electrical components inside the hub or blades are known, and typically comprise brush and slip ring arrangements.
However, known electrical connectors such as brush and slip ring connectors are generally not capable of supplying large amounts of power across the interface between the nacelle and hub. Therefore, in the case of de-icing systems for example, it is not possible to supply sufficient power to the hub to de-ice multiple blades simultaneously. In view of this limitation, some existing de-icing systems are configured to de-ice one blade at a time. It can take up to an hour to de-ice a single blade, so this restriction on power can lead to significant downtime of the wind turbine, which ultimately reduces the productivity of the wind turbine.
Against this background, the present invention aims to provide an improved electrical connector.